The South African Prison Population

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Waron

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There are shocking statistics on the Department of Correctional Services website - none more so than the fact that 3% of the entire 'coloured' population of South Africa is in prison (end of 2005). Compared to approx. 0.06% of any other race group (Black, White, Asian).

http://www.dcs.gov.za/WebStatistics/inmate-gen.aspx

If this was corrected, our prisons would actually be under populated!
 
Death penalty would fix this problem.

You don't even need jails; back in the day in the USA they never had Jails in places like Louisiana and Texas (and maybe a lot of other places). Just a bunch of tents everywhere in swamplands or deserts with a bunch of armed guard towers, worked very effectively, prisons should never be some 5star hotels.

On the other hand the ANC doesn’t care about the crime problem, they want the crime to get more out of control so that all you White people will leave.
 
Maronite Pride said:
Death penalty would fix this problem.
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I second that! For any violent crime death penalty sounds fair to me!

Maronite Pride said:
On the other hand the ANC doesn’t care about the crime problem, they want the crime to get more out of control so that all you White people will leave.
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yeah, it seems you are right on this one too
 
And the ANC government is so shocking in areas like service delivery etc. that some criminals want to end up in jail as they get food to eat (paid for by taxpayers) and other little presents (i.e. watching the World Cup Soccer final)
 
Maronite Pride : What baseless sepculation just to cause a scene in this thread.

Waron : Interesting stats
 
Maronite Pride said:
Death penalty would fix this problem.
Click to expand...

Indeed, along with rehabilitation for those where it is applicable. It is no good finally sentencing someone to ,say, a few years in jail, only to be released and to commit more of the same crimes again!
 
Why are the stats 60x higher for the coloured population (3% vs 0.05%). If South Africa could eradicate gangsterism and put in place the mechanisms for family counselling and drug and alcohol re-habilitation - focussing on these communities where crime is rampant....

.... we would solve the problem with our prison system. We would not have the number gangs that run our prisons and prevent any chance of prisoner rehabilitation.

It is a very difficult task to break the number gangs in prison when they make up such a large population of prisoners, but this needs to tackled.
 
Well I honestly do believe the whole, "coloureds were treated bad during apartheid, and now the new SA could care for them either".

their communities are probably the ones recieving the least support from government and from charities etc in general.

Yet they have the biggest crime and drugs problems. And those are purley economic problems. Black areas have the biggest rape problems by far, dont really know why though... a bit of believe/culture maby, their belief that raping a virgin cures AIDS etc. (When I say their I mean the tiny part of the rural population)

And coloureds unfortunatley have a huge gangster culture, dont know how to remedie that. It simply has to start from poverty alleviation.


oh and btw, dont let statisics like this give you such a bad impression of coloureds, there are many more middle class and rich coloureds in Cape Town that there are blacks. I went to a gig/house party kinda thing the other day, and it was at the coloured singer of a CPT death metal bands house. So when he annouced it, I thought damn, we gonna have to go to Mitchels plain or somewhere for this gig. But it was in Bishops Court... on the richest street in Cape Town.. i was pretty much surprised.
 
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Ekhaatvensters said:
dont let statisics like this give you such a bad impression of coloureds.
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I completely agree, I know and have met many coloured people who are as upstanding a person you could wish to meet.

The statistics are real, but I don't know the real reason behind them - it may be discrimination in our justice system or many criminals in a small area that makes it easier to make arrests.

I can only speculate about gangsterism and drug and alcohol abuse being the reason behind these stats, these are problems in the "traditionally coloured areas" and coloured people know this better than anyone.
 
I think one of the reasons is because of the Coloured Vs. Xhosa war going on in the Cape. Someone told me that they see the Blacks as taking their jobs and now they have some kind of African American gangster mentality.
 
There is racism between black and coloured communities, I wouldn't say this is a "war" or that it is felt by the majority of either group... but it does exist.

I am shocked that in the whole of South Africa 9% of our population is coloured and in prison 80% of the population is coloured.

I would hesitate to say that the coloured population is responsible for 80% of the crime in south africa - I'm sure this is not the case. But the prevalence of gangsterism in the coloured community and the number gangs in prison are not a coincedence.
 
Clearly very few offenders make it to prison.

We must be trying to create the first 100% tolerant society when it comes to crime.
 
What is the point of prison if they are run by gangs and only have a 15% (probably lower) success rate?
 
Maronite Pride said:
Death penalty would fix this problem.
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The problem is that you cannot just execute something - the process of ensuring that someone is 100% guilty is so expensive that it almost isn't worth it (I could try and find some links I found while researching this for a debate at school)

I am more for manual labour - at least then prisoners can begin to pay for themselves and you are helping to build infrastructure, and then there are no moral problems with the mass-killing of people ;)
 
What is the point of prison if they are run by gangs and only have a 15% (probably lower) success rate?
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there is no real point (although punishment and lock-up come to mind) - the real solution is to create a lawless society - oops we have already done that :D
 
kilps said:
The problem is that you cannot just execute something - the process of ensuring that someone is 100% guilty is so expensive that it almost isn't worth it (I could try and find some links I found while researching this for a debate at school)

I am more for manual labour - at least then prisoners can begin to pay for themselves and you are helping to build infrastructure, and then there are no moral problems with the mass-killing of people ;)
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Ask China (Asia in general) how they have an extremely low crime rate then. You’re caught doing a crime; you are sentences 30 minutes later and shot/hanged within an hour, works extremely well and relatively cheap (they even charge the cost to the family of the criminal, so actually it’s almost free).
 
Maronite Pride said:
Ask China (Asia in general) how they have an extremely low crime rate then. You’re caught doing a crime; you are sentences 30 minutes later and shot/hanged within an hour, works extremely well and relatively cheap (they even charge the cost to the family of the criminal, so actually it’s almost free).
Click to expand...
Effective yes - I just don't like the idea of just shooting someone :) - and besides that a process as simple as that with no appeals structures, time for the defence to prepare is unfair and wouldn't stand up anywere besides in a communist state ;)
 
milano said:
there is no real point (although punishment and lock-up come to mind)
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Is prison there to punish the offender or to protect society? Right now it punishes the offender but does nothing, maybe even the opposite of protecting society.
 
kilps said:
Effective yes - I just don't like the idea of just shooting someone :) - and besides that a process as simple as that with no appeals structures, time for the defence to prepare is unfair and wouldn't stand up anywere besides in a communist state ;)
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If it is obvious that a reason was involved (a dispute etc) then they do have time for defense and all that (it’s not like in China they’ll just sign the death penalty right away unless it’s obvious that there is a logical reason behind what happened), but if your some criminal who just shots someone and robs them of their money and you're caught red-handed, then there is no need for any of that, a bullet to the head solves the problem and criminals will think twice before they cause anymore problems. For pity crimes I would have gulags up in the Northern Cape, hard all day labor for 5 years (or whatever) would stop people for doing the crap that they do. Your liberal system just entices criminals to crime because there’s no punishment.
 
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